Blood Tribe joins tiny house movement with gigantic shop project

In the backyard of a Blood Tribe high school, students are working on a massive shop project — three tiny homes.

The 10 students at Kainai High School had to undergo a formal job application process, with resumes, references and interviews, to land the gig. Under the supervision of a longtime shop teacher with a background in construction, the young apprentices are learning how to build tiny homes from the ground up.

“We want to make them as valuable as possible as employees coming out of high school,” says Matthew Prete, a teacher who is helping run the program, which has attracted attention from across the country.

“We want to make them look good on a resume to an employer.”

Funded by grants from Ottawa and an Alberta non-profit, the 10-week program offers students academic credits, work experience and permits valued by industry.

They completed a college-level job site safety course, with plans to secure learner’s permits to drive, a valuable asset in a remote rural community. They may also take driver’s ed.

The students and their teachers are facing a deadline to have the tiny homes move-in ready by the time their course ends April 14. The school isn’t certain exactly what will be done with the tiny homes, though Prete knows people who are interested in buying them.

The tiny house movement has inspired a new generation of homeowners who are trading in their traditional homes for cramped quarters, usually 100 to 400 square feet.

It’s a unique lifestyle, which takes on a new definition of downsizing, but many are drawn by drastically reduced costs and a much smaller environmental footprint.

Should the Blood Tribe program continue, teachers expect students will build nine tiny homes a year. Working inside a greenhouse behind Kainai High School, the students are learning everything from framing and flooring to plumbing, electrical work and roofing.

Ryan Fox, a Grade 11 student, spent one recent morning installing two-by-fours beneath the homes so they can be moved once all the work is done. Speaking over the clamour of drills, hammers and saws, he says he prefers this learning environment over the classroom.

“(In) the classroom, you’re sitting down in a desk pretty much all day. It’s pretty boring,” Fox says. “Being here, walking around, working with power tools and everything, it’s pretty cool.”

Coming into the program, he wasn’t sure what he wanted to do after graduation. Now, he’s thinking seriously about the trades.

It’s a big turnaround from just a few weeks before, when Fox and the nine other students knew very little about carpentry.

“They were timid at first; very lacking in confidence,” says John Reid, a shop teacher with a background in homebuilding, who was brought out of retirement to run the program. “But you watch them now; they’re so capable and they learned how to use the equipment properly, safely.”

Reid says he has received calls from officials in Alberta and Ontario who are interested in replicating the program.

By the time it ends in mid-April, each of the students will be ready for some type of entry-level job, he says.

“There isn’t any of them that couldn’t get jobs here on the reserve, going out doing repairs,” he says.

Kainai High School student Ryan Fox works on one of the tiny houses he is helping to build at the school. The small homes are being built by students as part of a career training program offered at the Blood Reserve school. Fox feels the program is giving him new options for a career when he graduates. (Gavin Young/Postmedia) Gavin Young /
Postmedia

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